


if i'd told you (you would have stayed).

by thewritermakingdreamsreality



Category: Harlots (TV)
Genre: F/F, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-08
Updated: 2019-09-08
Packaged: 2020-10-12 08:21:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 612
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20561198
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thewritermakingdreamsreality/pseuds/thewritermakingdreamsreality
Summary: SPOILERS for 3x03It isn't until Mr. North carries an exhausted and bereaved Margaret Wells from the parlor, that Lady Isabella can be alone with Charlotte's body.





	if i'd told you (you would have stayed).

“I’ll sit with her tonight, Mr. North,” Lady Isabella’s voice wavers, tears cracking her soft syllables. Her throat is raw with the pressure of keeping her emotions sound for Charlotte’s family.

Her eyes are stuck on Charlotte. On the woman she calls her friend and her lover in the most hushed of tones.

Margaret Wells, Will North, Lucy Wells, Nancy Birch: they must weigh over Isabella’s own grief tonight. Charlotte was theirs for far longer than Isabella has had the chance to be hers.

“You have done more than enough, my ladyship,” Will’s strong voice is out of place in a house so broken. Margaret is in his arms, her eyelids fluttering. Her body unable to battle the need of sleep. The need to begin stitching the hole Charlotte has left in her mother.

Shaking her head, Isabella uses her hands to push herself from her place on the ground, just out of reach of Charlotte. She sweeps to the other side of the lounge and drops back to her knees.

Finally, she takes Charlotte’s hand in her own. It is cool and stiff and there is no returned pressure as there would have been an hour past. There is no life left in the body of her only and truest friend.

“I have not done enough. Mr. Garnett,” Lady Isabella calls to her staff before her self-pity can bubble out. Before she utters the words she knows are true. _I should have done more._

“Please escort Mr. North to the guest wing.”

“Thank you, Lady Fitzwilliam.”

“Isabella, please, Mr. North.” She squeezes Charlotte’s hand. Desperate to press Charlotte’s hand to her cheek, to her lips. Her face pinches as she tries to keep in the tears. Not yet. Soon. Soon she can cry and rage. Soon she can beg Charlotte to come back.

“Lady Isabella,” Will murmurs. Two sets of footsteps, his and Mr. Garnett’s, signal their departure.

“Leave us,” Isabella instructs her remaining staff. She can barely hear her own command. But it's heard by others, she knows. Their footsteps too depart.

Her breath rattles through her chest as she releases it. Pressing her lips to the back of Charlotte’s hand, her free fingers find Charlotte’s chilled cheek and trace over the soft angles she’s memorized. 

“You always burn the brightest, Charlotte Wells. And now,” the knot in Isabella’s throat creaks and her breath leaves her. “And look at you now, still. What am I to do with you?”

What is she to do without Charlotte? Without her boisterous laugh? Without her unwavering faith? Her soft smile?

“What am I to do?”

Shifting, she perches on the lounge next to Charlotte. She holds Charlotte’s hand to her chest, pressing it deep and grasping hard.

Something inside her ruptures against the pressure of their clasped hands in her sternum and she doubles over. A silent scream tears from her core and strains out of her and into Charlotte. 

“What do I do?”

Charlotte always knows what to do. She’s always one step ahead of Isabella. That’s why they’re a pair.

She swipes at her damp cheeks and her hand comes away caked in ruined paint and powder. She smears it on her gown before leaning forward and resting her head in the crook of Charlotte’s neck.

“I fear,” she pauses, her breath unsteady, “I fear I’ve never expressed to you how much you mean to me. That if I had sooner, if I’d told you how much I love you, you would have stayed.”

Isabella presses her lips to Charlotte’s neck and inhales Charlotte’s floral, earthy scent for the last time. “If I’d told you, you’d be here with me now.”

**Author's Note:**

> This story is really me finding a space to grieve Charlotte, as much as, Isabella needed the space to do so as well.


End file.
